MI6 2010: SCEA's marketing chief outlines shifting the PS3 ad focus from arrogant to amusing "It Only Does Everything" campaign.
Who was there: Peter Dille, senior vice president of marketing and PlayStation Network for Sony Computer Entertainment America delivered the opening keynote address to the MI6 games marketing conference.
What they talked about: While the people who make games have had plenty of opportunity to exchange ideas, network, and pat each other on the back this year at events like the Game Developers Conference and D.I.C.E., those who market games are only now getting the same opportunity. The fifth annual MI6 conference took place in San Francisco today, with an opening keynote address delivered by one of the biggest marketing execs in the business today.
Dille opened with an overview of his presentation, "Redefining the Digital Living Room." As it exists today, Dille said the digital living room consists of a multitude of devices working together to simplify a person's life. Dille pointed to an old audio system as an example, with a receiver, tuner, tape deck, speakers, CD player, and turntable all separate components on a giant rack, all just for the purpose of playing music.
"Today of course, you have an iPod. Hopefully it's on a Sony docking device so we can be involved in the music business," Dille joked.
Whether it's looking through photos, checking Facebook updates, streaming music through Pandora, playing a game, or watching a Blu-ray movie, Dille said people just didn't know there were products for the living room that did all that. That was at the heart of Sony's switch to the current "It Only Does Everything" marketing campaign.
Dille acknowledged that the original PS3 marketing campaign didn't communicate the system's virtues very well. However, "I'd like to think even the best messaging in the world wouldn't have done a whole lot to sell a $600 game machine in a wretched economy," Dille said. He added the reception for the "It Only Does Everything" ads has been tremendous, with other territories asking Sony to take the marketing campaign around the world.
Just like console companies push exclusive games to sell their systems, Dille said SCEA is pushing original exclusive content to make the PlayStation Network a default destination for users. To that end, the company has created the downloadable gaming show Pulse, as well as the reality TV-style The Tester, in which a variety of gamers compete in a variety of contests to become a game tester.
"I love the tears," Dille joked after showing clips of heartbroken Tester contestants being booted from the show. "I think if my kid got voted off the show, I'd be like, 'Yeah! He can go to college!' But these guys really want to be a tester."
Online gaming is one of the fundamental features of the PlayStation Network, and Dille said Sony has noticed players hopping online to socialize as much as to compete in games. While people in the past would gather on the playground or by the water cooler to talk about movies and games they'd seen, online networks let people have those conversations within the games they enjoy. That was part of what made Call of Duty more than just another hit game, he said.
"If you didn't have it, not only were you left out of the conversation happening on the playground, you were left out of the conversation happening in your social circle," Dille said.
One area that needs improvement, Dille said, is to articulate to consumers what's possible with Sony's products. He acknowledged that shortcoming just after discussing the PSP's existing and upcoming remote play functions with the PS3, which will let users queue up downloads, play games, and watch movies on the console from the handheld, among other things.
In a post-presentation Q&A, Dille was asked what went wrong with the PSP Go and what Sony was doing to fix it. Dille explained there was a perception among people that the PSP Go would replace the existing line of UMD-equipped PSP systems, but that was never the case. "We've always said the majority of our business will be done on the PSP-3000," Dille said. Beyond that, Dille said Sony needs to continue to push for the product and better communicate to retailers why they should be carrying or promoting a gaming product for which they won't be selling any software.
When asked about the evolution of Sony's PS3 marketing over the years, Dille said the goal was just to change people's perceptions of the system from just being a game system to being a multipurpose machine. The original PlayStation 3 ads, filled with abstract imagery, creepy babies in white rooms and the like, were intended to get across the power of the system. However, Sony's research found people were intimidated by the ads, Dille said, and they played into some customers' notions of Sony as an arrogant company.
"We've done away with that," Dille said. "We're back with our mojo with the sense of humor people loved from older PS advertising. I think it's just a more likable connection to the consumer."
Quote: "We're very proud of our gaming heritage. But we don't see ourselves as just a gaming company," Dille said.
Takeaway: Another quote of Dille's summed up the presentation well. "For us, the living room is not a physical space. It's a seamless and personalized entertainment experience without walls. It's the ability to deliver information and entertainment value to consumers where and when they want it."
Brendan Sinclair has been a games journalist since 1999. His tastes are eclectic, though he has a definite affinity for games with arcade roots. He's Canadian, but has also been at home in Atlanta, Austin, Chicago, and San Francisco.
"Dille said the goal was just to change people's perceptions of the system from just being a game system to being a multipurpose machine" All the while continuing to strip out functionality like the OtherOS which truly made the PS3 a multipurpose machine (on it's own, regardless and beyond that of the GameOS functionality)...
omfg I can't believe this is coming from Sony the same time as the v 3.21 down("up")grade that removes the OtherOS option - effectively making the PS3 fat that could run a plethora of PC apps to being simply a gaming machine.. Sony has some Fing nerve!
I'm so glad they got rid of those freaky commercials. There's only one awesome one which shows off all of the PS3s capabilities, whereas the new ones are all hilarious. KEVIN BUTLER IS KING!
"they played into some customers' notions of Sony as an arrogant company. " As compared to whom? Microsoft? Activision? EA? The majority of people who see Sony as arrogant, are video game reviewers and "journalists" who work for sites like Gamespot or write online blogs and act as shills for Microsoft. Period.
Yeah, that's what I got out of the commercials: "PS3 so powerful, it can make babies!!!!" *sarcasm* I gotta say I Love all the new commercials. Kevin Butler FTW!
@KaizerJinn lmao, I knew there'd be someone who picked up on that. I've not played it for a loooooooong time so it wasn't the freshest game in memory! In fact I'm between games now so I might have another MGS4 playthrough. Fantastic as it is though, I always found it to be a little over-rated. I found the whole "buy ammo anytime" thing and complete lack of stealth (not a single camera in the entire game) to be a problem for me.
@tmorri603 I agree. I LOVE ALL GAME SYSTEMS FOR WHATEVER THEY ARE WORTH. JUST HAVE FUN PEOPLE!!!!! PS3, 360, WII, ALL OF EM ARE MY FAVORITE FOR SOME REAON.. EVEN IF IT'S ONE FOR EACH.
@DeadnBuried not to be picky... BUT MGS4 should of been the first game to come to mind, not the last in the listing(just teasing) LoL. easily ONE of the BEST games ever. LoL.(yes i like the game that much) =D
@rht992 LMAO!!! i love that commercial. LoL. =*D "with a stick" LoL... i loved all the PS3 commercials, but i definitely like the humorous ones they've been coming out with. =D @macwr ...oh, how i love irony. LoL
i liked all the ads, it was good Sony were willing to try something abstract, it didn't pay off but not everything does.
when i watched the baby commercial i realised how powerful the ps3 was and went out to buy it
danowns1207 I gave your fact a chance and looked into it and it was false it says on the first page what i said "Xbox 360 finished with the highest number of positively-reviewed titles (88 games receiving a Metascore of 75 or higher" so why dont you pay a little more attention and everyone who wants to complain go ahead if I really upset you THAT MUCH!
@blakeney - I totally agree, though I favor the x360 over the PS3 that doesn't mean I want them to fail. Having healthy competition is great at protecting the consumers by giving them a choice.
@ Zanoh, your point would carry a much bigger punch if anyother console in the history of consoles had this feature.
@ Darkages04 exactly! Its all about personal preference. That could be decided by all kinds of things, like what all your mates play on, down to special features the chosen console has to offer. There is NO right or rong. Competition in these industrys is VERY healthy, if there was only one console on the market, the makers would be screwing us at every moment possible, trust me.
Though not a fan of Sony and they wont surpass MS this gen, it's good to see them finally get their act together.
I used to own both systems but when my 360 broke down i said there is no way ima put out another $300 for the same system after owning it for a month. Ps3 is going strong now, the library is a killer just like 360s. 1 thing i dont like when fanboys tell me that MS payed for mw2 dlc to come out first cause they care about the users. First of all the 2mil that MS payed so that the dlc comes out first on xbox is payed buy the users of xboxlive they used ur money and than told u to pay $15 for the dlc.
monson21502, i would like to point out that the beta on uncharted only featured a fiew play types in the multiplayer, and on top of that, nothing could be controled. lol some of us here get the joke about disk space, but take a look at games like ff13, which is 3 disks on 360, and 1 on the ps3, or gow3, which is 30gigs, which wouldnt fit on dvd9. besides that, do u have a job by chance? cause if you did id assume you wouldnt be able to put more than 40 hours into a game, considering a fulltime work schedual, needed sleep, food, and possibly social time if your not to big of a nerd lol. Sony has a little of everything for any kind of gamer, and thats easy to realize if you own the system and actually play games like mgs4, re2, gow3, heavyrain, infamous, uncharted 1 and 2, a better version of dragon age and a fiew more without completly filling up this comment. i also assume you dont own a ps3 considering your only defence for games being boring was a beta =)
LoL so I decided to come read the story here until I saw so many thumbs down, it was obvious everyone is arguin like babies . These consoles have been out long enough now and still there are people causing war over whats the best. Damn, Its like everyone is still in kindergarden. Nuff of the arguing, yall suppose to be happy with the games, not the consoles.
@lordinuyasha21 - and any other 360 fanboy You may have *more* games. But the 360 was released a year before the PS3, and in that year it had a lot of PS2 ports produced for it, as well as shovelware. I'm not gunna deny that the 360 has more games or good games, of course it does. But it's 2010, and anyone STILL trying to say the PS3 has no good games is a complete fool. Uncharted 1+2, Gran Turismo 5, Demon's Souls, Heavy Rain, Killzone 2, Valkyria Chronicles, Disgaea 3, God of War 1/2/3, Ratchet and Clank, MAG, White Knight Chronicles, Modnation Racers, Folklore, inFamous, Warhawk, Heavenly Sword, MGS4. All of those are real exclusives, ONLY on PS3, you can't get them for PC. Add to that all of the multi-platform games and forthcoming exclusives (FF14, Agent and Killzone 3 to name a few) and the PS3 is crushing in every genre now. So just grow up and accept that will you? Your ignorance is three years out of date now. >_>
@Kou-Nurasaka Of course they are going after the people who haven't bought the console. What use would it be to advertise to the ones who HAVE bought it? This whole thing about "they need to appeal to the hardcore gamer" is absolutely ludicrous. That demographic comprises a VERY small part of the electronics buying public. The idea is to appeal to a LARGE audience, not a small one. Some may call it the "casual gamer" market (a term which I abhor), but what they are really going for is the GUY market. Which is why Sony and other game companies advertise on things like the NFL, NBA, Major League Baseball, the NHL, racing, Spike TV, Comedy Central, etc. Those are the types of things that 18-39 year old males watch. The real reason that I think that a lot of gamers don't like Sony's advertising is because they aren't "guys" in the traditional sense. I've heard the same story countless times; "Sony doesn't advertise. They do? I've never seen it? On Monday Night Football, The Daily Show, Family Guy, and the NBA Game of the Week? I don't like football, basketball, I don't watch Comedy Central because gamers don't like to laugh, and I think Family Guy is 'unrealistic', I mean the dog talks! So because I haven't seen it, Sony doesn't advertise".
ever since the bluray won, the console war was never the same. PS3 can do everything and it also do your mom, if you haven't bought one yet.
gskywalker09: I do not appreciate that you stole my pic ;) But I agree with your comment.
i like this. the average person probably is intimidated by a ps3, and they are probably typecasting it as just a system for gaming when it has such a multitude of other functions. like thae analogy made of comparing a old rack stereo setup to the simplicity of just owning an ipod and a cord. the ps3 is a one stop item in the same sense. youre combining many components into one sexy little machine.
If you remove a feature of the console, I highly doubt you can say it does 'everything'. Anyway, ring me up when it's $200.
I think the reason that video game commercials are so bad is because they seem to be focusing on getting the non-gamers into playing video games, and instead are forgetting about the rest of us who are actually going to buy these games. That being said, I like the "PS3 Marketing Executive" commercials. Those make me laugh.
@monson21502 That's because your simply not looking looking for one. PS3 NOW as in 2010 not 2007 Has over 500 game titles in it's library and lets not even get into it's greatest hits list, which is now over 50. MLB 10 the show, Uncharted 1-2, heavy rain are not worth more than 7 days of renting? LOL!!! Thats a joke right? @lordinuyasha21 Your facts are factless you walk into a gamestop store that crap console has more used games than the PS2 does.(Even before the PS2 got less support) All of 360's so called hits came on to PC or the PS3 at one point or another. And PS3 gives you more variety of genres all 360's can give you is stolen broken down franchises and shooters. 360's library is a joke.
I remenber when the ad was "You can't believe everything you read on the Internet otherwise I'd be a Nigerian millionaire by now."
@monson21502 ummmm the X360 fanboy got board from a ps3 exclusive... thats not even an opinion you simply dislike the game because it is not on your favorite console. hey at least your not the only one doing that mindless fanboys do it all the time but your on top because you feel the Need to say such thing just to the PS3's exclusive puke load of times
People need to stop complaining about the ps3 not being backwards compatible. If you have ps2 games, then play them on your ps2. Also, you can still get a backward compatible ps3 if you check gamestop or ebay. I still have my BC PS3.
Microsoft confirms that it won't charge any fees for any titles eligible for resale. Full Story
Playing Xbox One games on somebody else's console will also require a check-in every hour. Full Story
Sony confirms a $399/€399/£349 price for the PlayStation 4 hardware, $100 cheaper than Microsoft's Xbox One. Full Story
Will be coming in 2014. Full Story
Pan's Labyrinth director praises Ken Levine and Irrational Games for latest BioShock, says he would consider large-scale Pacific Rim game "God willing." Full Story
Xbox boss Don Mattrick believes concerns over connectivity are overblown, recommends Xbox 360 for those without an Internet connection. Full Story
EA Labels boss Frank Gibeau describes new project as "open-world action adventure game." Full Story
Sony on why it won't hinder PS4 used games--flexibility creates value
PlayStation boss Jack Tretton says ability to freely resell games creates value in the initial purchase; PS4 won't require online check-in because many...
